Did you know that plenty of startup founders choose to launch their products and startups at SXSW? In this Austin, Texas music festival, tech founders can find early adopters, investors, co-founders and more. Here are some ways for you to hustle at SXSW.

Hustle like Uber, Airbnb and Lyft

Uber, Lyft, Airbnb have released their new features and pricing models at SXSW events in the past, capitalizing on the crowd, the demand and the tech savy "tester" consumers of this progressive music and game festival.

Participate in a Hackathon or Competition

Previously, SXSW sponsored Eco environment, social entrepreneurship as well as educational startup competitions, pitch events, and hackathons. Participate and get amazing exposures to the tech elites and YC startups, investors who frequent these events.

http://sxsweco.com/news/2015/launch-your-startup

http://www.sxswedu.com/launch

Participate in Release It SXSW Pitch

Participate in a special edition pitch event judged by industry experts at the SXSW startup village. This event is open to all new startups.

Women Who Code community group female programmer, women programmer, women developer community picture at the giant conference logo.

Women Who Code community group female programmer, women programmer, women developer community picture at the giant conference logo.

Take a photo with the giant Google IO logo and claim some bragging rights as an Android fan Google Android geek. at the worlds largest Android Google Developer conference.

Meet the Udacity team and course booth at the Google IO developer conference, android fan festival. Udacity and Google has a Android nanodegree partnership. You can meet the team and get your questions answered here.

Meet the Udacity staff from your online course
and nanodegree in real life at the Google IO

Saturday, December 24, 2016

While these super cute Santa hat wearing Pikachu's are limited edition, they are not hard to find at all in any major cities and their town center landmarks. Keep in mind, Niantic uses Google Map API and the augmented reality game studio and its Ingres testers prefer artistic cultural centers. In San Francisco, it is easy to find holiday Christmas Pikachu from Pokémon GO at the performance arts center, symphony hall and city street art, city murals.

Some players have been saving extra Pidgey's to evolve during Christmas hoping for another bonus XP event when XP is automatically doubled even without a lucky egg.

Starting Christmas Day, special event, holiday pikachu will appear with much higher frequencies.

I have been playing Pokémon GO religiously. While I am still only at level 29. I have collected nearly all the Pokémon's in the pokedex only missing the legendary, regional (I got mr mime during my visit to the U.K.), and a couple of normal ones. 142 pokemons!

Have you heard? Niantic the Pokemon Go team released limited edition Christmas Pikachu into the wild. These cute Pikachu's will not increase your Pokedex count but comes animated with a red mini Christmas hat. It's super cute and you can keep it in your pocket unless your transfer it away. Super cute! How do you get them? First you have to be playing the game. Next be sure to find the landmark spots in your city! No.1 tourist spots like the Eiffel Tower? A great idea! The city's architectural wonder library? Probably! Small town? No problem. Google (Niantic's map partner and previous parent company) really encourages appreciation for nature, arts and culture (many pokestops are arts, sculptures, landmarks and parks). Visit your local art houses - operas, symphony hall, giant wall murals. These are great places to find Christmas Pikachu's! In our city - San Francisco, you can find it near the Civic Center performance arts center and Roots an art collective with a giant illustration mural on its side wall in SOMA.

You have set up your Shopify store, now what? It's time to get your first sales. How? While there are many opportunities to make sales online (the entire ecommerce market is huge), it's hard to get a slice of the big pie. At first. Here are a few tips for you. My store was featured in Christmas 2015 by UberRUSH (Uber postmate delivery) as a top 50 San Francisco small business store on the Shopify platform. www.at-lotus.com we sell high quality gifts that you often find in modern art museum stores!

Message to fellow sellersHi sellers, I just wrote this blog post. Please give me some feedback if you can. This is my advice to future sellers on Shopify platform. My store was featured on UberRUSH San Francisco as a top 50 small business seller. They featured my store last Christmas. 2 of my products reached the top 5 list!Among my tips mentioned in the above blog post, 1. generating noise on social media (using hashtags is very important) and 2. frequently checking and making discount offers in abandoned carts are two top tips that generate the most increase in sales.

Generate some noise on Social Media

Social media is your grassroots marketing. Spread the word about your products on Twitter, Facebook, and Pinterest.

Enable store function on Social Media

Did you know that you can sell your products directly on Facebook, Pinterest, and Twitter? Shopify platform allows you to partner up with the big guys: run a Facebook store and enable Buyable pins in minutes. Don't forget Wanelo.

Spread the words to friends and family

I personally emailed my friends to ask them to consider my store for their Christmas shopping. I offered free gift wrapping, tax discount 10% off purchase, steep discount for slow items... They were doing me a favor but also gained value by getting free delivery, free advice and discounts.

Use the #ShopifyPicks hashtag

Shopify's social media account will feature cool meaningful products on the Shopify platform. You can potentially get them to pay attention to you by using the #ShopifyPicks hashtag. Do not spam. Play nice.

Post to relevant forums

How did you find my blog post? You likely saw it in the Shopify forum just now. Special interest forums guarantees you perfectly targeted audience, who are also supportive and responsive. They are your most relevant audience. Selling special skateboard and parts, better look for the best forums. You are guaranteed thousands of visitors and some great feedback if you ask.

Check abandoned carts often

Initially when your store needs time to mature and perfect, customers may visit your store and lose trust, interest or encounter difficulties. Use the Abandoned Cart feature to identify these potential customers, write them messages and offer a timely discount code.

Hustle and don't give up.

I bought startup and entrepreneurship posters and posted them on my wall. I even wrote XyzName Hustles on my coffee mug. Whenever things get difficult, I get a mini boost from those entrepreneurship quotes.

I live and eat in the Silicon Valley. I write about everything Silicon Valley including startup, tech, learn to code, food and ecommerce.

If you are interviewing as a social media manager or growth hacker, your interviewer may ask you which blog do you follow on a regular basis. You may want to visit these blogs below and mention them during your interview: